I have often wondered if I filled my mind with too many memories that most people just toss aside.  Do most forget the bad and only remember the good?  Or do we need the combination of good and bad to learn and grow?

Anyone would remember the day the college acceptance letters came.  There are so many insecure moments in a teenage life that the neatly typed letter with the college seal can suddenly make all the difference in the world. It is the validation that says you really are okay.  It suddenly does not matter if you were popular, handsome, pretty, smarter or could run faster than anyone else because someone somewhere thought you had value.

There were letters that arrived in my mailbox that told me I was okay from every place I applied to. Naturally my parents were pleased but I knew it would not be my choice as to which college was chosen. The choice of Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri was my Mother's pick but the final acceptance was determined by a visit from a College representative. 

One would have thought the President of the United States was coming to visit.  For the three weeks preceding The Visit the already immaculate house was thoroughly cleaned several times.  Shopping trips for just the right items of clothing were frequent. Since my hair had become very blonde my Mother had it dyed back to some supposedly "natural" shade of brown.  The reasoning was that I needed to look more wholesome.  When the final date approached I learned that it was the same night of my Senior Lifesaving Class final test.  It was necessary for me to pass the test in order to get the job I was offered for the summer.   I dashed in the door late in a wet bathing suit, wet hair and clutching all my school clothes and books. 

The gentlemen from Stephens was chatting with my very distraught Mother and smiling Father when I arrived.   What the conversation was about does not stick in my mind since all I could think about was the dress Mother had picked out still hanging in my room.  He smiled and laughed a lot probably thinking about my wet bathing suit making a huge water spot on the upholstered chair.  At the end of the interview he did announce that he was pleased to let us know I would be an incoming freshman at Stephens College. Much later I learned that from the home interviews he matched up roommates.

As I spent the summer delivering newspaper at dawn and basking in the sun all day as the only lifeguard at the public country club swimming pool Mother was gleaning over the school handbook, With The Ivy.  It was filled with all the rules and regulations she applauded.   I only liked the pictures of the huge ivy covered buildings on the tree covered campus. She shopped for dorm room decorations and clothes for me.  I tried to match the clothes she bought to my stacks of Seventeen magazines and wondered  what style book she was looking at.

Finally the departure day arrived.  Stephens had made plane reservations for all the incoming freshmen.  I was to fly from Tulsa to Kansas City to meet up with all the girls from the western part of the country.  On the same day planes landed in St.Louis with all the girls from the east.  Chartered buses met us and we were off to Columbia.  I had never flown before, I was going off to college, I had luggage for the first time in my life all of which should have been exciting.  I was only terrified.  Landing in Kansas City I was put into a huge group of girls giggling and laughing.   It seemed like they were all dressed in the Seventeen magazine outfits with blonde hair.  

Standing in the vast airport terminal in a horrible brown dress the same color as the tan I acquired and the dyed to match hair I wanted to hide in some corner and have a good cry.  Too bad the zombie movies were not popular at the time.  I would have instantly been cast for a part on the spot. The worst was not over yet.

No one told me that upon arrival in Columbia on the bus we would be greeted by what seemed to be hundreds of boys.  The University of Missouri was only a few blocks from Stephens.  It was an annual tradition for them boys to meet the buses to check out the new crop of Stephens Suzy's, as we were called.

As I shuffled, yes shuffled because by this time my feet would not bend in those shoes.  I could only slide them along the pavement or pick them up and put them down flat much like a horse tromping down the street, I wondered if the horrors of the day were over. No such luck.  Getting to my dorm room on the fourth floor I had to pass through more giggling girls finding out where each other was from. I heard New York City, Los Angeles, Hawaii and on an on. How could I tell anyone I was from Muskogee, Oklahoma of all places?  The real bright spot of the day, as I look back, was that stupid song about my hometown was yet to be recorded.

The dorm room was stacked with boxes shipped ahead of time. Girls from next door and across the hall popped in an out.  Introductions with names and hometowns whirled around me a in constant blur. It seemed like hours passed as I sort of hid in that room wondering what to do.  Where could my roommate be?  She had to have arrived in Columbia the same time I did or maybe she wasn't coming.  Maybe I could just hide in that room all by myself.

All of a sudden this girl walks in the room with the biggest blue eyes I have ever seen and beautiful blonde hair. She said "Hi, I'm Cathie. You have to be my roomie!"

  For the next forty years she would constantly remind me that my mouth flew open when I saw her.  Every insecurity I ever had cut thru me like a knife that moment I met her.  She filled a room with her presence, she never met a stranger, she was always late for everything, there was not rule she wouldn't break.

Needless to say it was a very rocky start for me to even like her.  But laughter slowly begin to fill the entire dorm. Our room was always filled with girls and our days filled with crazy antics.  Over the course of the next forty years she would pop up on my doorstep, fill my mailbox with crazy letters and slowly taught me to be my own person.